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JavaScript JavaScript Loops, Arrays and Objects Tracking Data Using Objects The Build an Object Challenge, Part 2 Solution

What is the prefered syntax, and is there a reason the instructor chooses this method?

The lesson instructs us to use the print function as such.

function print(message) { var outputDiv = document.getElementById('output'); outputDiv.innerHTML = message; }

The method i was taught takes less space and seems easier to read.

function print(message) { document.getElementById('output').innerHTML = message; }

The result is the same. Is there a reason the instructor prefers the first method?

1 Answer

Steven Parker
Steven Parker
229,670 Points

I can't speak for the instructor, but based on many questions I've seen in the forum, students often find concepts easier to understand when broken down into steps. This is probably the value in performing the element selection separately from the attribute assignment.

In actual practice, I would also write it as a one-liner as in your second example, unless the reference to the element was to be used again later in the function.